“Once we have a growth mindset, everything on the outside will change along with it.” 

As the world of work is undergoing constant changes with technology keep establishing, it is important for individuals to consistently change and be flexible with the change. Jeremy Wade, founding director of Jindal Centre for Social Innovation, said that degrees and skills will not be enough for individuals to face the everyday reality of workforce. Instead, it is the mindset that profoundly shapes your decisions and ability to help you adapt to change over time.

The good of having a growth mindset culture in workplace 

Investing in the development of mindset in workplace can give many positive results to both employers and employees. According to a study by Carol Dweck et al., there are three significant benefits of developing cultures with growth mindset, including improving trust within workforce, boosting a sense of ownership and commitments in employees, and building stronger agreement that company supports risk-taking.

Moreover, employers often invest in embedding the mindset because it helps instil the belief in continuous learning and development, provides the right environment for employees wellbeing, and encourage higher levels of collaboration within a team. Indeed, growth mindset cultures help employees develop and improve with effort, added Dweck. 

See also: Embedding HR Tech: It’s More about Changing the Mindset

Given way these self-beliefs shape social interaction, job performance and personal well-being, the appeal of cultivating the mindset culture might seem obvious. However, developing a sense of the mindset is a life journey on its own. Shifting people’s mind to have a growth mindset is not easy. Psychological research mentioned that once people’s minds are made up on important matters, changing them can be as difficult as stopping train hurtling at full speed.

Removing the myth, improving drivers for growth mindset adoption 

Interviewing more than 20 HR practitioners around the world, Grant et al. found that the most common barrier organisation failed to help their employees have a growth mindset is due to misusing and misunderstanding the concept of the mindset. 

For example, Grant cited that growth mindset means striving for business success when in reality, it is a continuous belief that improvement is possible and that failures are opportunities to learn. Another misinterpretation is that the mindset is binary when in reality, people are not confined to one mindset or the other. Yet, leaders cannot expect a chronic change, habitual mindset in a moment.

There are some other myths of growth mindset that spread throughout a company, hindering them from developing its people to possess the right mindset, added Grant. To eliminate this, leaders should truly understand what growth mindset means. Growth mindset is defined as a belief that skills and abilities can be improved, and that developing skills and abilities is the purpose of the work done.

The drivers for developing the mindset in workplace itself can be categorised in four parts, as follows: 

• Business improvement such as introducing agile methodology into work streams, restructuring teams, implementing a new business strategy, and increasing the speed of go-to-market ability. 
• Maturation, including evolution from “start-up to growth-up” company, an expansion often accompanies by turmoil, financial pressure, or other setbacks. 
• Reinvention such as efforts to change a culture or reorganise during or after experiencing financial problems. 
• Performance management transformation like international improvement or overhaul of performance management process. 

Instilling the habit of growth mindset 

Once you are able to build the mindset in your employees, it is important to instil the mindset. To do that, you can try the following tips. 

• Continuous role modelling and talking about mindset development 
• Recognising and describing behaviours on whiteboards
• Celebrating success such as putting posters along the office walls
• Emphasising in a performance conversation such as giving and receiving feedback in all directions 
• Playing a growth mindset board game during lunch 
• Setting lobby with a physical “graveyard of failed ideas” to motivate employees to do better 
• Using growth mindset reminder cards
• Starting to change language and words. For instance, replace negative to developmental phrases, use win-learn-change in weekly performance reflection. Use “what if and yet” to spur expansive thinking, and use the phrase “how are you going to move beyond this?” or “what is the next thing you will do?” during a check-in conversation. 

Read also: Helping Employees Cultivate a Growth Mindset Could Boost Business Success